Chapter 23 Burn
BURN
The lights had gone out ten minutes ago, plunging their cell into total blackness.
Burn lay on his side, his chest to Noelle’s back, the cold of the floor pressed along one part of his body and the warmth of her soft curves against the other. It was like being caught between two worlds—one of comfort, the other of pain.
They’d taken off their shirts earlier—he and Bright—despite Noelle’s protests. She hadn’t wanted to accept the makeshift bedding, hadn’t wanted either of them to be cold. But of course, Bright had deflected her objections with charm.
“You’re much too delicate, my lady,” the Light Twin had said, his tone playful but gentle. “We can’t have you freezing to death.”
“And besides,” Burn had rumbled, “Kindred run hotter than humans. We can keep ourselves warm.”
Eventually, she’d relented, and now her slender frame was nestled between them, cocooned between their heat and their bare chests, Bright curled around her front and Burn was behind her.
Her breathing was slow now, her head tucked under Bright’s chin.
She was asleep, or close to it. Burn could feel the rise and fall of her curvy body with every breath she took.
The soft press of her backside against his stomach and her scent, warm and feminine and sweet, filled his nose and wrapped around his thoughts.
She’s safe now. She’s safe, he told himself over and over.
But the words were useless. The past which he had carefully buried had been unleashed in his mind and he couldn’t cover it again.
His body was rigid with tension. His fists clenched. His teeth ached from grinding.
Don’t think about it, he ordered himself. Don’t go back there. Don’t think about it…
But the dark invited old memories like open wounds invite flies.
Burn pushed and pushed…cramming the memories away, like shoving unquiet corpses back into the soil.
At last his big body relaxed and sleep claimed him.
But with it came the nightmare.
* * *
It was supposed to be a family holiday.
They were all together—Burns Hot, his twin, Speaks Wisdom, their mother, and both of their fathers. The shuttle was gliding through the upper atmosphere of Twin Moons, headed toward Chi’let—the smaller of the planet’s two moons.
“The water is supposed to taste like basslam nectar,” their mother was saying as she leaned over the seat, her dark hair swaying like silk. “You two will probably like it so much you’ll drink the streams dry and we’ll have nothing left to swim in!”
Burns laughed, even though he was twelve and just beginning to feel too old for kid jokes. Speaks Wisdom laughed too, bright and golden, elbowing him with a grin that made his heart lift.
He loved his mother—goddess, she was beautiful—and his two fathers were the strongest men he knew.
As for Speaks… well, Speaks was like the air he breathed.
Like gravity. He was just always there—Burn’s other half.
Burn never took time to appreciate him because would a person think about how much they loved their own hand?
Their own breath? Of course not. They just took it for granted.
Until it was gone.
The screech came first.
A horrible, metal-on-metal sound, like claws dragging across the skin of the ship.
“What was that?” his mother asked, her smile fading.
“Nothing, darling—just relax,” called Tells Reason, Burn’s Light Twin father, from the cockpit.
But Burn heard the edge in his voice.
Then the sound came again—sharper this time—louder.
Grips Hard—his Dark Twin father—swore under his breath.
“We have to break free before they—”
And then—
BOOM.
The entire shuttle rocked. A deafening roar filled the air, and the door to the shuttle blew open in a shower of sparks.
They were inside in seconds.
The pirates were huge—hulking monsters with metal-plated armor and glowing red eyes. Burn couldn’t understand how they had moved so fast. One moment the door was closed, the next the air was filled with screams and smoke.
“Get back!” His fathers, Tells Reason and Grips Hard, rushed out of the cockpit, weapons drawn, shields up.
But it wasn’t enough.
The pirates fired.
The sound of the blasters was like thunder inside Burn’s skull. He watched—frozen—as both of his fathers went down, one after the other. First Reason, then Grips.
No weapons…no shields…no more protection. They were just…gone.
“Father!” Speaks Wisdom screamed, and their mother’s voice broke into sobs as she knelt beside their bodies. Blood pooled under them, dark and wrong.
“Get the woman!” one of the pirates growled. “She’ll fetch the highest price.”
“NO!” Speaks darted in front of her, his arms outstretched. “You can’t take her! Leave my mother alone, you bastards!”
“SPEAKS!” Burn screamed—but his voice came too late.
There was a bright flash of light and a sound like the world tearing in half.
And then—
Silence…nothing.
Burn didn’t feel the pain. He didn’t feel the floor when his knees hit it. All he felt was the sudden emptiness. The hollow echo in his chest. Like his lungs wouldn’t fill. Like he couldn’t breathe.
Because Speaks Wisdom was gone.
Just…gone.
The Twin-Bond that had tied them together since the moment they’d shared a womb was severed and emptiness rushed in to fill its place.
Burn clutched his chest to scream again…but the sound never made it out of his throat.
“No… no, no, no…” It was barely a whisper.
He couldn’t move…he couldn’t even crawl.
Half his soul was gone…half his body was numb.
He lay there, shaking, his cheek pressed to the metal floor, as they tore his mother from Speaks’s lifeless arms.
“Let me go!” she shrieked. “Let me stay with my sons!”
But the pirates only laughed and dragged her away.
Burn saw her fingers clawing the air. Her beautiful face was a mask of agony as she mouthed his name
And he couldn’t do a damn thing to save her.